Do you remember 20 years ago when your mother warned “don’t believe everything you hear”?
Now, do you remember last week when she sent you a link on Facebook to an article claiming coconut oil cures cancer?
On this level, it’s almost funny to see how easily content on the internet can misconstrue facts or outright lie, and still be taken as truth by a vigilant audience. Yet this simple action is indicative of a far greater, disturbing trend.
In early October 2016, the PEW Research Centre conducted a survey regarding the U.S. Presidential Election. In doing so, they discovered 81% of respondents believed Clinton and Trump supporters not only disagreed over the candidate’s plans and policies, but could not even agree on basic facts. Browse social media for an hour or so and you’ll find the same sentiment cropping up across a range of topics.
How has this come to be? When the internet first went public, it was lauded as the pinnacle of information technology, the tool that would allow all of humanity to discover the truth in just a few clicks.
Time has proved the opposite is the real truth. The internet is devolving into nothing more than a hub for echo chambers, each growing rapidly, while the art of discussion and debate is lost as users try desperately to preserve their beliefs, or squash those of others. And it’s only getting worse.
Today, The New York Times have reported that Facebook are developing censorship software that will allow them to reintroduce their service into China. This isn’t the first time the company has bowed to censorship laws – they have done the same in countries like Pakistan and Turkey – but the new software goes further in that it allows third-party groups to monitor users’ feeds.
“Facebook does not intend to suppress the posts itself. Instead, it would offer the software to enable a third party — in this case, most likely a partner Chinese company — to monitor popular stories and topics that bubble up as users share them across the social network, the people said. Facebook’s partner would then have full control to decide whether those posts should show up in users’ feeds.”
24/7 reactive censorship, right in your home. YOUR home. For while the software is designed for use exclusively in China, the principles behind it are mirrored in Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement last week that Facebook would be amping up the fight against fake news sources on the platform by reshaping internal policy, and further streamlining users’ ability to report controversial or illegitimate content.
Superficially, it may seem a move in the right direction, but consider what it really represents. Fake news is as old as the concept of news itself, but the current trend plaguing Facebook is a direct result of their decision in August to fire the entire news editing team, and replace them with an algorithm that posted a fake article less than 24 hours later.
Instead of accepting this – or perhaps they can’t accept it, if they made the staff redundant – they have chosen to give users authority to declare what news is real or fake based entirely on their own perspective. It’s a system any troll could easily manipulate (for the same reason Youtube’s Hero Program is such a bad idea), and one that will only compound the problem because it overlooks the fact that users already have a similar power, one they activate by simply ignoring or hiding the content they disagree with.
Those who are susceptible to this content must be educated in how to recognise it the same way they were taught to avoid e-mail scams, or more generalised spam. The rest should not be treated as fools unable to make up their minds as to whether a source and its product are legitimate or otherwise, for such an attitude kills that which makes us critical and reasonable.
As the program is expanded, the power of proof will continue to dwindle. Given the option to choose their own narrative and thrive in ignorance, many will happily accept a world where their political views are never challenged, and blueberries reverse the ageing process. We will grow further and further apart. Facts will be dismissed as opinion. And only when we wake to find nothing but darkness will we realise how blind we became to the realities of life.